Teaching self control skills like anger management to kids in school through mentoring programmes has a positive impact on their classroom behavior, suggests a study.

The study conducted by the Researchers at University of Rochester Medical Center has revealed that the children enrolled in a school-run mentoring program were more capable of handling anger and other emotions than others, thereby facing fewer disciplinary referrals.

"This study suggests that with appropriate guidance from a trained adult, young children are capable of learning a great deal about their emotions and skills for handling their emotions effectively and those skills can have direct, positive benefits for their functioning in school." said Peter Wyman, Ph.D., lead author of the study and associate professor of Psychiatry at the Medical Center.

226 children studied
The study looked at 226 students, facing behavioral or social problems at school, from two different elementary schools.

The target group was selected due to the evidence that the problems faced by these students could lead them to major issues like abuse and school drop-outs in the near future.

The students were further enrolled in a three-month mentoring course at school which focused on imparting behavioral traits like discipline, anger control, social skills etc.

At the end of the program, the students were rated on some specific parameters set by the researchers.

Results of the study
Besides showing improvement in almost all the classroom behavior domains, the children had a 43 percent reduction in mean suspensions as compared to the others who were not a part of the program.

“The intervention had a positive impact on children's classroom behaviors and rates of disciplinary incidents, including fewer aggressive or disruptive problems, improved on-task learning behaviors and peer social skills, and less shy-withdrawn and more assertive behaviors” the researchers said.

The children also showed a 46 percent decline in disciplinary referrals from school authorities, claimed the study.

However it was noticed that only the girls showed some improvement in their peer social skills after the 3 month schedule.

“The intervention had a positive impact on children's classroom behaviors and rates of disciplinary incidents, including fewer aggressive or disruptive problems, improved on-task learning behaviors and peer social skills, and less shy-withdrawn and more assertive behaviors,” Peter Wyman concluded.

The study has been published in the Journal of Abnormal Child Behavior.